New book focuses on disinformation in elections

As the 2024 Election draws near, the influx of news reports, social media posts and rhetoric about the political candidates intensifies. The biggest question is, ‘what information is accurate, and what is not?’

An in-depth collection of studies of disinformation, or inaccurate information that is deliberately shared in the election cycle, is the subject of a new book edited by Lance Porter (MA ’98, PhD ’02) called, “The Disinformers: Social Media, Disinformation and Elections.”

Porter, the Karen W. and Daniel J. King Distinguished Professor in Advertising at Grady College, says the goal of this book is to give people confidence in the election process and teach them to make logical decisions.

“We really do have a solid system here in the way that it works,” Porter said.  “It’s very robust, and it’s independent, and it’s really difficult for anyone to tamper with.”

The book features insight from polit­ical scientists, media scholars, computer scientists and cybersecurity experts and is the result of network of contacts Porter has built over the years. An international perspective is included with a study of disinformation in Russia and the Netherlands, as well.

Topics include, but are not limited to, a cybersecurity perspective of disinformation, disinformation in the Latinx community and how young voters view disinformation.

Porter says there is a lot of weight of the election coverage that falls on journalists, but it is confusing to audiences.

“Journalism needs to cover both sides of an issue, so they have to talk about both sides to represent both views. But there are certain issues that are not both sides. Some things are just not true. If journalists cover something that isn’t true as if there are two sides to the issue, no one knows what to believe, so people just quit listening and they disengage,” Porter says.

He continues: “It’s dismaying to me that so many people don’t trust on our election system anymore and therefore don’t trust our system of government and that’s not good for anybody. That’s not good for our system. I hope that ultimately, the book is a positive read and allows people to have some perspective on this.”

Porter’s interest in disinformation in elections stemmed from two events taking place at Louisiana State University, where he taught at the time. In 2016, Porter coordinated LSU’s involvement in Electionland, a nationwide effort involving more than 150 local and national newsrooms working together to detect problems with the elections. There were very few reports of election tampering, and that event reinforced to Porter how sound the U.S. election system is.

The second event that served as a catalyst for the book was Porter’s role curating the John Breaux Symposium in 2020, an annual panel discussion of current media topics, which that year focused on “Hacking Democracy: Technology, the Internet & Politics.” At the end of the symposia, most of the panelists agreed to write a chapter for the book.

Itai Himelboim, the Thomas C. Dowden Professor of Media Analytics at Grady College, co-authored a chapter about how misinformed social media posts go viral. Other contributors to the book include Claudia Flores-Saviaga, Jacob Groshek, Itai Himelboim, David Karpf, Yotam Ophir, Josephine Lukito, Jakob Ohme, Golden Richard III, Saiph Savage, Sander Andreas Schwarz and Dror Walter.

Author: Sarah Freeman, freemans@uga.edu

Contact: Lance Porter, Lance.Porter@uga.edu